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THE COLLEGE BEAUTIFUL 

AND OTHER POEMS 



by y 

KATHARINE LEE BATES 



<&?>SY OF CC 

o 0EC 16 '887 J / 



&.}/fy6 



PRINTED FOR THE BENEFIT OF 

THE NORUMBEGA FUND 

1887 






\ 









* .-• » 



\ 












\S 



Copyright, 1887, 
By KATHARINE LEE BATES. 



The Riverside Press> Cambridge : 
Printed by H. O. Houghton & Co. 



CONTENTS. 





PAGE 


The College Beautiful 


I 




8 


oLEEP ••••••.•< 


9 






Lines for Longfellow's Birthday 


14 


Longfellow : In Memoriam 


. 14 




17 




18 




20 


Mr. Edward Olney, Sir .... 


20 




23 


Consider the Lilies 


. 28 


The Organist 


29 


Watching the Wedding .... 


• 3 1 




35 


Mine own Countrie 


• 35 


The Songs of the Future . 


38 


A Song of Waking ..... 


• 39 


The Praise of Nature .... 


41 


Non Nobis Solum ... 


• 44 




45 


Rainy Days 


• 47 


The Golden Wedding . 


48 


Our Baby . . .... 


• 52 


Sleeping Bessie 


53 




• 56 



iv CONTENTS. 

Seeking the Spring 57 

Out of Sight of Land .... 59 

Under the Snows 60 

Flight 61 

The Chamber of Peace 62 

The Birth of Spring 63 

The New Jerusalem 65 

Azrael 66 

The Remonstrance 67 

The New Year 70 




THE COLLEGE BEAUTIFUL. 



i. 

LUE are the skies, but for flake and 
feather 
Of floating cloudlet as white as wool ; 
Blue they bend in the winsome weather 
Over the College Beautiful. 




ii. 

Fair she stands in her fresh apparel 
Of scented blossoms and silken leaves 

That June, to the tune of the robin's carol, 
From the golden threads of the sunshine 
weaves. 



in. 



Dance the daisies a blithe cotillion ; 

The oriole, flaunting his orange coat, 
Trills and trolls in a green pavilion 

Lays of love from a mellow throat. 



2 THE COLLEGE BEAUTIFUL. 

IV. 

Till from rustic doorway the squirrel peeping 
Drops his acorn to chide and rail, 

Jealous court in the oak-tree keeping, 
Canopied under his royal tail. 

v. 

In and out of the honeyed clover 

Saileth the moth on resplendent wings, 

Dusky purples all damasked over 
With gold and ruby emblazonings. 

VI. 

The whispering wind, as it swiftly passes 
From elm to hickory, lightly bends 

The plumy tops of the dewy grasses, 

Making the ferns and the mosses friends, 

VII. 

And dimples Waban, to mirth beguiling 

Those waves where the violets, early missed 

By their bluebird poets, dwell sainted, smiling 
Up thro' the tremulous amethyst. 

VIII. 

While over the brink, like a soul that searches 
For love divine in a human guise, 



THE COLLEGE BEAUTIFUL. 3 

Droop the boughs of the silver birches, 
Reaching after the mirrored skies. 

IX. 

But above the blooms and the tufted mosses, 

Azure lakelet and dipping spray, 
Lifts the College her steadfast crosses, 

Pointing ever the heavenward way. 

x. 

Foster Mother, our hearts confess thee 
By love's election their rightful Queen. 

Long, oh long may the sweet stars bless thee 
With dews baptismal and solemn sheen. 

XI. 

Long thro' thy silent casements slanted 
May the silvery shafts of moonlight fall 

On sculptor's dream in the stone enchanted, 
Stately pillar and pictured wall. 

XII. 

Long may the orient sunbeams glisten 

On thy laureled busts that, with tranquil 
looks, 

From their ordered thrones seem still to listen 
To the voices sealed in their faded books. 



4 THE COLLEGE BEAUTIFUL. 

XIII. 

Long may the twilight rose and amber, 

While the stealthy shadows of night increase, 

Flush the walls of thine upper chamber, 

The hallowed chamber whose name is Peace. 

XIV. 

Yet O ye halls and ye arching spaces, 

Echoing tones to memory sweet, 
Waves reflecting familiar faces, 

Wood-paths worn by beloved feet, 

xv. 

Pageant of fretted roofs that cluster 

On hill and knoll in the branches green, 

Ye are but shadow, and not the lustre, 
Garment ye of a grace unseen. 

XVI. 

All our life is confused with fable, 
Ever the fact as the phantasy seems : 

Yet the world of spirit lies sure and stable, 
Under the shows of the world of dreams. 

XVII. 

Not an idle and false derision 

The rocks that crumble, the stars that fail ; 
Meaning masketh within the vision, 

Shaping the folds of the woven veil. 



THE COLLEGE BEAUTIFUL. 

XVIII. 

Regal mountains in purple vested, 
Foaming torrents that seaward leap, 

Coral isles with their palm-trees crested, 
Fleecy clouds where the lightnings sleep, 

XIX. 

Suns that flame in their crystal dwelling, 
Still concealing, must still declare 

Glories their splendid pomp excelling, 
Truth too pure for our souls to bear. 

xx. 

Thus where the angels' songs are blending 
With the silver sound of the builder's tool, 

Year by year are the walls ascending 
Of the mystic College, the Beautiful. 

XXI. 

Ah, light too keen for our wistful glances ! 

Darkens the vision and words wax cold. 
Faintly flash on the spirit's trances 

Those marble turrets and fanes of gold, 

XXII. 

Where far in the fair, ethereal spaces 
Of the realm ideal, celestial lands, 

The College reared of womanly graces, 
Honor and mercy and wisdom stands. 



6 THE COLLEGE BEAUTIFUL. 

XXIII. 

There hoar Learning, forgetful warden, 
Leans on his staff and smiling sees 

Maidens pillage his thornset garden, 
Dreaming of new Hesperides. 

XXIV. 

And Hope looks forth from her eastern tower 
For these, who have fed on the fruits divine, 

To return to the radiant gates, with dower 
Of fragrant deeds to enwreathe the shrine. 

xxv. 

Not Indian gems nor Sabasan spices, 

Silken wefts nor ivories rare 
Frosted over with quaint devices, 

Are the tribute due at that altar-stair. 

XXVI. 

Richer the treasure our crypt inherits, 
Prayers for lilies, and words of ruth 

For odorous balms ; for diamonds, spirits 
Iridescent with central truth. 

XXVII. 

Such gifts were theirs, whose names are spoken 
With filial praise in our palace gate, 

Their gold and silver but chrismal token 
Of lives anointed and consecrate. 



THE COLLEGE BEAUTIFUL. 7 

XXVIII. 

Call them blessed, whose pure endeavor 

Wrought in the world like redeeming leaven. 

Blessing shall follow their steps forever, 
All the pathway from earth to heaven. 

XXIX. 

His that already the light hath gilded, 
Hers in the shadow that fare alone ; 

For well we know on what Rock they builded, 
Even on Christ the Corner-Stone. 

XXX. 

And we, whom the gracious shade embraces 
Of the groves they planted, fain would take 

On the rising bulwarks our loyal places, 
Speeding the labor for love's dear sake. 

XXXI. 

With soaring arches and gleaming spires 
Of aspiration, with cloistered aisles 

Where Patience muses her meek desires 

And Faith sheds light from her lifted smiles, 

XXXII. 

On truth's white columns of alabaster, 
Meting the walls by the Golden Rule, 

After the plan of the All-Wise Master 
Building the College Beautiful. 



8 COLLEGE SONG. 




COLLEGE SONG. 

LL hail to the College Beautiful ! 

All hail to the Wellesley blue ! 
All hail to the girls who are gathering 
pearls 
From the shells that open to few ! 
From the shells upcast by the ebbing Past 

On the shores where, faithful and true, 
An earnest band, with the groping hand, 
Are seeking the jewels from under the sand, 
And spreading abroad through the breadth of 
the land 
The name of the Wellesley blue. 

chorus. 

All hail to the College Beautiful ! 

All hail to the royal throne, 
Whence, her heart within her burning, 
Silver voiced, far-eyed Learning 

Looks upon her own ! 

All hail to the College Beautiful ! 
All hail to the sacred walls, 
Where, sinking away in shadowy gray, 
Still the sun's last radiance falls ! 
Where first on the lake the day-beams 

awake, 
And the Spring's white manacles break. 



SLEEP. 9 

But flushed in waking or pale in rest, 

With leaves on her hair or with snows on her 

breast, 
Forever the fairest and noblest and best, 
All hail to her sacred walls ! 

chorus. 

All hail to the College Beautiful ! 

All hail to the royal throne, 
Whence, her heart within her burning, 
Silver-voiced, far-eyed Learning 

Looks upon her own ! 




SLEEP. 

LAY me down before the rustic gate 
That opens on the shadowed land of 
sleep. 

I famish for its fruits and may not wait 
To quaff the drowsy waters cool and deep. 
I knock, O Sleep the Comforter ! Again 
My weakness faints unto thy great caress. 
The circling thought beats blindly through the 

brain 
With dull persistency of barren pain, 
And draws uncertain doubting and distress 
To prove that man unto himself is utter weari- 
ness. 



I O SLEEP. 

Upon these withered grasses is no rest. 
Thy crimson-dotted mosses are denied. 
In dewy vines I see thy portal dressed, 
But know that only on the further side 
The purple grapes droop over. Take me in ! 
I do not fear to trust myself to thee. 
Waking and danger are of closer kin, 
But what hast thou to do with grief or sin ? 
Imprisoned from myself, I wander free, 
And no resplendent sun of noon grants such 
security. 

I would not lie to-night so near the bars, 
If to thy realm fair entrance I may find, 
That through them I might view our mortal 

stars 
Or hear the passing of our pilgrim wind. 
Not even would I wish some gentle friend 
To lean against them with a loving face, 
For rest and life were never willed to blend, 
And as I watched the day unto its end, 
So would I sleep the night without a trace 
Not only of day's grievousness, but even of its 

grace. 

Nor spread my couch within thy garden-beds, 
Where fairy forms from out the blossoms glance, 
And catch the yellow moonlight on their heads 
To shift it swiftly in the swaying dance. 



SLEEP. 1 1 

Nor wrap my limbs in thine enchanted cloak 
Beneath the tree whose hollow shadows teem 
With changing faces of fantastic folk 
And dim, dissolving shapes, — thy wizard oak 
Whose every leaf conceals a fabled dream, 
Whose dipping boughs disturb thy hushed and 
holy stream. 

But take me to thy kingdom's very heart, 

solemn Sleep, with thee alone to dwell. 
In deepest grotto hide me, far apart 

From tone or touch, and guard mine eyelids 

well. 
Yea, charm the weary senses deaf and blind, 
And let me there lie face to face with thee. 
So shall the morning cleave the clouds to find 
Thy fragrance clinging to my waking mind, 
But what thy lips did whisper unto me 

1 '11 bear too fine for consciousness, too deep 

for memory. 

Then call my footsteps in, O silent warden, 
For even as I plead, night waxes late. 
Call thou my feet to rest within the garden 
And lift the latches of the rustic gate. 
There grant me shelter till the blushing east 
Proclaim another sun, whose golden gaze 
Shall view me passing, from thy trance released, 
With glad heart forth to share the generous 
feast 



12 CLARA. 



Of life, to run in God's appointed ways, 
The songs of weariness all hushed in sweeter 
psalms of praise. 




CLARA. 

SOUL of music and wind, 

So pure from the gates of birth, 
That how could we hope to bind 
The rare and beautiful mind 
To a perishing form of earth ? 

She quivered within its hold, 
Yet we loved her, ah, so well, 

That we thought our love might fold 

Her spirit against the cold 

Of this land wherein we dwell. 

But still through our tenderest word, 
Through the sea's mysterious tone, 

Through the song of our sweetest bird, 

She listened and ever heard 
An echo beyond our own. 

The shadow troubled her sore 
That holdeth our mortal eyes ; 

We weep, for forevermore 

The vision of that dim shore 
In beauty before her lies. 



CLARA. 13 

For the voice grew clear in her ears, 

While she gladdened our daily sight ; 
The shadow slipt from the years, 
Till she vanished between our tears 
And fled out into the light. 

A soul of music and wind, 

A spirit of radiant mirth, 
A heart that thrilled to its kind, 
A life with our lives entwined, 

An ecstacy fled from earth. 

We meet our loss as we may ; 

We turn to our toils again ; 
But a glory has passed from the day, 
And all that we think or say 

Bears a hidden sense of pain. 

Yet we look on time's swift stream 

No more with a faithless eye, 
Nor of life and death can deem 
That the sleep forgets the dream, 

Who have seen our dear one die. 

From the cloud-land whither she passed, 

Where her passing left a rift, 
A glimmer of light is cast 
On our paths, and we hold it fast, 

As we treasure her latest gift. 



14 



LONGFELLOW: LN MEMORIAM. 



LINES FOR LONGFELLOW'S BIRTH- 
DAY. 




O the land of granite and ice, 

In the month of frost and snow, 
A strain of music from Paradise 
Came seeking a home below. 
It entered a child's white heart, 

And the little human tent 
Grew to a shrine for its guest divine, — 
The poem the gods had sent. 

Now the rocky hills are crossed 

By snatches of happy tune. 
The month of darkness and frost 

We honor above the June. 
For thou, O poet we love, 

Art the bloom of our northern clime, 
And we know that song, through the ages long, 

Is the sweetest fruit of time. 



LONGFELLOW: IN MEMORIAM. 

LAS, our harp of harps ! the instru- 
ment 
On whose fine strings the nymph 
Parnassus-bred 




LONGFELLOW: IN MEMORIAM. I 5 

Played ever most melodiously is rent, 
And all the music fled. 



Alas, cur torch of truth ! the lofty light 
That yet a tender household radiance cast, 
And made the cottage as the palace bright, 
Is blotted out at last. 

Alas, the sweet pure life, that ripened still 
To holier thought and more benignant grace, 
Hath spread its wings, and who is left to fill 
The dear and empty place ? 

How poor thou art, O bleak Atlantic coast ! 
How barren all thy hills, my mother-land ! 
Where now amid the nations is thy boast, 
And where thy Delphic band ? 

Of that bright group who sang among thy wheat, 
And cheered thy reapers lest their brown arms 

tire, 
Whom ermined Europe raised a hand to greet, 
As princes of the lyre, 

The first have fallen, and the others wait, 
The snow of years on each beloved head, 
With weary feet before the sunset gate 
That opens toward the Dead. 



1 6 LONGFELLOW: IN ME MORI AM. 

And who abides to sing away our pain, 
As these our bards we carry to their rest ? 
We need thy comfort for the tears that rain, 
O poet, on thy breast. 

It is our earth, where prophet steps grow few, 
For which we weep, and not, O harper gray, 
For thee, who caroled from the morning dew 
To noontide of the day, 

Nor left thy task when twilight down the wall 
Stole silently in shadowy flakes and bars, 
And whose clear tones, while night enfolded all, 
Sang on beneath the stars. 

The knights and dames had bent their heads to 

list, 
The serving-maids were hearkening from the 

stair, 
And little childish faces, mother-kissed, 
Had flocked about thy chair, 

When ceased thy fingers in the strings to weave, 
O'er thine anointed sight the eyelids fell ; 
And thou wert sleeping, who from dawn to eve 
Hadst wrought so wondrous well. 

O gentle minstrel, may thy rest be deep 
And tranquil, as thy working-tide was long, 



TO SHELLEY. \J 

Our lonely hearts will grudge thee not thy 
sleep, 
Who grudged us not thy song. 




TO SHELLEY. 

Born near Horsham, Sussex, August 4, 1792. Drowned 
in the Bay of Spezzia, July 8, 1822. 

I. 

HENE'ER I hear the wind, I think 
of thee, 
O Shelley, bird of most aerial note, 
Who pouredst kindred songs from thy 
clear throat, 
As passion wild, impetuous, and free, 
As shrill with sudden ecstacies of glee 
And hoarse with human agonies which smote 
Thy gentlest heart till it would fain devote 
Its music unto man's captivity. 
For thou wouldst have all chains of pride and 

fear, 
Which rust the willing spirit where they bind, 
Dissolved in love, as shadows disappear 
Before the sun ; to evil unresigned^ 
Urging the nobler discontent we hear 
In all the restless voices of the wind. 



1 8 MA TTHE W ARNOLD. 



II. 

The summer comes again, by vale and hill 
With blossoms fashioning her fragrant way ; 
But thou, the child of summer, to the day 
Art long unknown, and all thy steps are still. 
In summer wert thou born, and thou didst fill 
Thy scanty urn of years while summer spray 
Whitened the shores where thy mute image lay, 
Robbed of its poet. Hence the summers will 
Seek thee in vain. The eye that watched the 

cloud 
Hath locked its sight beneath the fallen lid ; 
The ear that heard the skylark's note is vowed 
To a perpetual silence. Thou art hid 
Beyond the summers, and thy name belongs 
But to a ceaseless melody of songs. 



MATTHEW ARNOLD : 

ON HEARING HIM READ HIS POEMS IN BOSTON. 

STRANGER, schooled to gentle arts, 
He stept before the curious throng ; 
His path into our waiting hearts 
Already paved by song. 

Full well we knew his choristers, 

Whose plaintive voices haunt our rest, 




MA TTHE W ARNOLD. 1 9 

Those sable-vested harbingers 
Of melancholy guest. 

We smiled on him for love of these, 
With eyes that swift grew dim to scan 

Beneath the veil of courteous ease 
The faith-forsaken man. 

To his sad gaze the weary shows 

And fashions of our vain estate, 
Our shallow pain and false repose, 

Our barren love and hate, 

Are shadows in a land of graves, 

Where creeds, the bubbles of a dream, 

Flash each and fade, like melting waves 
Upon a moonlight stream. 

Yet loyal to his own despair, 

Erect beneath a darkened sky, 
He deems the thorniest truth more fair 

Than any gilded lie ; 

And stands, the spectre of his age, 

With hopeless hands that bind the sheaf, 

Claiming God's work without His wage, 
The bard of unbelief. 



20 MR. EDWARD OLNEY, SIR. 




MUSARUM SACERDOS. 

[HO called himself your priest, Immor- 
tal Choir ? 
Not Dante, though in ruddiest altar- 
flame 
He plunged his torch, and bore it through the 

shame 
Of deepening hell to domes of starry fire, 
In steadfast temple-service. Not that sire 
Of glorious chant, our Milton, he who came 
With solemn tread and vestments purged from 

blame 
To swing the censer of divine desire. 
But Horace, sipping at your crystal spring 
As lightly as he quaffed his Sabine wine, 
Caught up that lute, about whose golden string 
The rose and myrtle he was deft to twine, 
And sweetly sang, in pauses of the feast, 
" The poet is the gods' anointed priest." 



MR. EDWARD OLNEY, SIR. 

R. Edward Olney, Sir, 
Of me you shall not win renown; 
You thought to write an Algebra 
For pastime ere your sun went down. 




MR. EDWARD OLNEY, SIR. 21 

You 're not the child to draw it mild. 
The very Sphinx your pen inspired ; 
The father of an hundred woes, 
You are not one to be admired. 

Mr. Edward Olney, Sir, 
I know you proud to evolve your surds ; 
Your pride is yet no mate for mine, 
Too proud to count myself three-thirds. 
Nor would I break for your sweet sake 
A heart that bounds to truer glee ; 
A single line of Thomas Hood 
Is worth a dozen formulae. 

Mr. Edward Olney, Sir, 
Some meeker pupil you must find, 
For could I mete the Milky Way, 
I would not stoop to such a mind. 
You sought to prove how I aould cube, 
And my disdain is my reply; 
Your stovepipe hat upon the nail 
Is not more stiff to you than I. 

Mr. Edward Olney, Sir, 

You bring strange sights before my eye : 

Not thrice your birthday cakes have baked, 

Since I beheld young Phoebe cry. 

Oh, your curved lines ! your minus signs ! 

A great professor you may be, 



22 MR. EDWARD OLNEY, SIR. 

But there was that upon her cheek 
Which you had hardly cared to see. 

Mr. Edward Olney, Sir, 
When thus she met her mother's view, 
She had the passions of her kind, 
She spake some certain truths of you ; 
Indeed, I heard one bitter word 
That scarce could justly be defined. 
Her sentence lacked the accurate terms, 
That stamp a mathematic mind. 

Mr. Edward Olney, Sir, 

A spectre haunts your college-walk, 

The guilt of tears is at your door, 

You changed a wholesome heart to chalk. 

You fixed the course without remorse, 

Regardless of her sore lament, 

And when the day of trial came, 

You slew her with an eight per cent. 

Trust me, Edward Olney, Sir, 

Orion and the Pleiades, 

From the blue heavens above us bent, 

Smile at your minutes and degrees. 

Howe'er it be, it seems to me 

'T is only fair ourselves to please ; 

Dry eyes are more than decimals, 

And happy hearts than indices. 



GEOLOGY MADE EASY. 



23 



I know you, Edward Olney, Sir, 

You pine among your roots and powers ; 

The rolling light of your red eyes 

Is weary of the languid hours. 

'Mid wondering trains, with boundless brains, 

But sickening of a vague disease, 

You know so ill to factor time, 

You needs must play such pranks as these. 

Edward, Edward Olney, Sir, 
If time hangs heavy on your hands, 
Are there no hinges off your gate, 
Nor any weeds upon your lands ? 
Oh, teach your little girl to bake, 
Or teach your little boy to hoe ! 
Pray heaven for a human heart, 
And let the foolish freshmen go. 



GEOLOGY MADE EASY. 

u Write me then 
As one who loves his fellowmen." 




TELL a tale which makes me pale 

For its dismal recollections, 
That coming classes may avail 
Themselves of its inflections. 



24 GEOLOGY MADE EASY. 

I conned the rocks with an anxious eye, 

A student meek and docile, 
When a distant whisper floated by, 
" Oh, come and be a fossil ! " 



Farewell the Cenozoic Age, 
With all its toiling daughters ! 

Wise Time turned back his yellow page ; 
I swam in ancient waters. 



And first I met in the aching void 

The solemn Eozoon, 
And only the stem of the salt Crinoid 

Vibrated to my moan. 

il I 'm lonely in the world/' I cried, 
And shouted o'er and o'er, 
But not a Rhizopod replied 
From the silent Protozoa. 

The Graptolite and the Trilobite 
To a gladder temper won me, 

But oh, for the Orthoceretite, 

And the smile he smiled upon me ! 

11 Thou Brachiopod, art mollusk or worm ? " 
I asked with a mixed sensation, 
But I fled from the frivolous Placoderm, 
Nor lingered for conversation. 



GEOLOGY MADE EASY. 2$ 

I blushed to hear the Ganoid wail ; 

He sobbed, " I 'm not a stoic, 
And I 've lost my vertebrated tail 

In the early Mesozoic" 

But I scoffed and longed for a Teliost, 
With the most intense of wishes ; 

For my sympathies had all been lost 
On those queer Devonian fishes. 

The Belemnite and the Polyp weird 

Exceedingly did act ill, 
And from the Lepidodendron jeered 

The bitter Pterodactyl. 

I sought to rest on the marshy shore, 
Where the Labyrinthodonts amble, 

But I heard the hoarse Batrachian roar 
'Neath a cryptogamic bramble. 

Yet the sedimentary fear I name 

And my igneous indignation, 
By a metamorphic move, became 

A quite distinct formation. 

The beast I saw was shy and small, 

No elephant or camel, 
'T was only a marsupial, 

But oh ! it was a mammal ! 



26 GEOLOGY MADE EASY. 

I leapt for joy, but hope deceives ; 

With heat he seemed to swelter, 
The Cycad 'neath her fronded leaves 

In vain proposed a shelter. 

He scorned that generous Gymnosperm ; 

No Conifer revived him ; 
He vanished, never to return ; 

His jaw alone survived him. ' 

The sombre Sigillaria sighed ; 

He would not linger for us, 
And only to our calls replied 

The winsome Ichthyosaurus. 

"Too bad!' the Saurian murmured, "but 
He '11 surely come to-morrow ; " 
While down the drear Connecticut 
The Dinosaur marched in sorrow. 

But soon Herbivores arose, 

Nor far behind the Lemur ; 
And some that had too many toes, 

Which gave a proud demeanor. 

But now I mourned my task begun, 

The country grew so hilly ; 
I didn't like the Mastodon, 

And found the glaciers chilly. 



GEOLOGY MADE EASY. 2J 

My gentle temper had been wrecked, 

That used to be so placid. 
I had a headache, the effect 

Of much carbonic acid. 

" My bones/' I said, "from toil you can 
Find only one vacation ; 
Before the coming Age of Man, 
Try solidification. 

" A modest shale or argillyte 

Would make a pleasing closet, 
Or in a sober syenite 
Your relics I '11 deposit." 

" Not so," says Fate ; " you '11 have to wait ; 
I can't accept your datum. 
Geology prepares her late 

And most distressing stratum. 

" A future race shall seek your place, 
Your geologic station, 
And find your last imbedded trace 
In the examination." 



28 CONSIDER THE LILIES. 



wm 




CONSIDER THE LILIES. 

pSiJ f N dewy hedge and thicket dim 

The birds have trilled their matin 
hymn. 
The sun hath journeyed on his way 
Far from the ruby gates of day. 

Then lift your lovely looks. Awake, 
O dreaming buds of Waban Lake ! 
The only missing grace supply 
To dipping boughs and mirrored sky. 

No bee enticed from honeyed wood, 
No golden-belted Robin Hood 
Shall, turning pirate, do offence 
To your unveiled innocence. 

Hush ! one by one and two by two, 
They sparkle on the waters blue, 
A sweet and stainless sisterhood, 
Surpassing all similitude. 

So may my heart in waking praise 
The Giver of benignant days, 
With morning blossoms fresh and fair, 
The pure resolve, the fragrant prayer. 




THE ORGANIST, 29 



THE ORGANIST. 

LOWLY I circle the dim, dizzy stair, 
Wrapt in my cloak's gray fold, 
Holding my heart lest it throb to the 
air 
Its radiant secret, for though I be old, 
Though I totter and rock like a ship in the 

wind, 
And the sunbeams come unto me broken and 

blind, 
Yet my spirit drinks youth from the treasure we 
hold, 

Richer than gold. 

Princes below me, lips wet from the wine 

Hush at my organ's swell ; 
Ladies applaud me with clappings as fine 

As showers that splash in a musical well. 
But their ears only hear mighty melodies ringing, 
And their souls never know 't is my angel there 

singing, 
That the grand organ-angel awakes in his cell 

Under my spell. 

There in the midst of the wandering pipes, 
Far from the gleaming keys, 



30 THE ORGANIST. 

And the organ-front with its gilded stripes, 

My glorious angel lies sleeping at ease. 
And the hand of a stranger may beat at his 

gate, 
And the ear of a stranger may listen and wait, 
But he only cries in his pain for these, 

Witless to please. 

Angel, my angel, the old man's hand 

Knoweth thy silver way ; 
I loose thy lips from their silence-band 

And over thy heart-strings my fingers play, 
While the song peals forth from thy mellow- 
throat, 
And my spirit climbs on the climbing note, 
Till I mingle thy tone with the tones away, 

Over the day. 

So I look up as I follow the tone, 

Up with my dim old eyes, 
And I wonder if organs have angels alone, 
Or if, as my fancy might almost surmise, 
Each man in his heart folds an angel with 

wings, 
An angel that slumbers, but wakens and sings, 
When thrilled by the touch that is sympathy- 
wise, 

Bidding it rise. 




WATCHING THE WEDDING. 3 1 

WATCHING THE WEDDING. 

^HO can tell me where I 'm going, 
Tell a little maid like me, 



With her fingers worn for sewing, 
But her soul as full of glee 
As of scented, blushing blossoms yonder twisted 
apple-tree. 

For perchance my life is twisted 

Out of shape in so much thread ; 
I was never flrmly-wristed, 
With a steady back and head, 
And you taste so many stitches in a single loaf 
of bread. 

And by eve my arms grow tired, 

Underneath their level stare, 
Shaping folds to be admired 
On these ladies, who are fair. 
Would we look so white, I wonder, if we had 
such silks to wear. 

For to serve another's beauty 

All the days when you are young, 
And to do a mirror's duty, 

With the ever-praising tongue ; 
— Would you rather sing, red robin, or like 
sometimes to be sung ? 



32 WATCHING THE WEDDING. 

I forget — to stain with sorrow 

This clear-colored holiday. 
Yesterday and the to-morrow 
Have no robin on their spray. 
Can you tell me where I 'm going, winding 
down the woodland way ? 

No, Sir Squirrel, you 've no notion, 

With your bushy tail a-swell. 
You may make a fine commotion 
In the branches where you dwell. 
You may chatter till the nuts fall. I can keep 
my secret well. 

Holding back these saplings pliant, 

I can catch a perfume sweet ; 
I can see my rock, the giant, 
Crouching in the noonday heat, 
With the last pale Mayflowers dying clustered 
round his shaggy feet. 

And above there is the highway, 

And beyond there is the church. 
They will not be looking my way, 
Even if this friendly birch 
Did not shield me as completely as a bird upon 
her perch. 

Little dreameth she who lingers 

Here, and thou — thou dreamest less, 



WATCHING THE WEDDING. 33 

Bonny bridegroom, what small fingers 
Wrought thy lady's wedding-dress, 
Who the mysteries might whisper of that bridal 
loveliness ? 

I may laugh, — 't is close and shady, — 

Workmanship will have its pride, 
And I fashioned yon fair lady, 
Sewing stitches in my side. 
Youth is good and love is better, but the satin 
makes the bride. 

Now they come. I hear the voices, 
And the merry church-bells ring, 
While the very wood rejoices, 
For the birds fly up to sing. 
Hush ! to weep upon their coming were a 
wicked welcoming. 

I will shape my lips to kindness, 
Smiling on them, ere they go. 
It were sudden cure for blindness 
To behold them pacing so, 
She with modest, drooping lashes, he with eager 
looks aglow. 

Bonny bridegroom, art thou idle 

In my craft, when all is said ? 
Dost thou weave no raiment bridal 

For the lady thou shalt wed ? 



34 WATCHING THE WEDDING. 

Dost thou shape her true-love vesture, sewing 
with a golden thread ? 

Prithee, brother artist, speed me 

With a little of thy skill. 
For I fear thou dost exceed me, 
And my labor shows but ill. 
Yet — oh, shame if thy seam parteth, while my 
dull thread holdeth still ! 

So I praise a shining treasure, 

If no nearer than a star. 
So I steal a bitter pleasure, 
Watching weddings from afar. 
But before the little seamstress long and dim 
the pathways are. 

Nay ! my robin is turned raven, 

And his wings were feathered wrong. 
Certes, he is but a craven, 

Who would sing me such a song. 
I will run again and seek him. I will search 
the lane along. 

I may find my fate's redressing ; 

I may meet a crooked witch, 
Or a statue, white with blessing, 
Wandered from its Roman niche, 
Or a folded bud to blossom even while I sit and 
stitch. 



MINE OWN CO UN TRIE. 



35 



MEMORIAL DAY. 




TREW blossoms on their graves, for 
this is well — 
Pale roses and the sweet-lipped violet ; 
The pansy, still with tears of memory 
wet ; 
And lilies of the valley, wont to knell 
The fairies' requiem in the wooded dell ; 
Sad heliotrope and tender mignonette, 
Frail tokens that our land doth not forget 
The hero sons who for her honor fell. 
But O my brothers ! even while ye stoop 
These flowers to scatter, be it yours to pay 
A better homage. Quit your greed and shame ; 
Purge our high places, lest our banner droop, 
Soiled by the touch of men less pure than they 
Whose loyal blood once cleansed our nation's 
name. 



MINE OWN COUNTRIE. 




ANY the lands that the true-hearted 
honor ; 
Many the banners that blow on the 
sea ; 



36 MINE OWN CO UN TRIE. 

Ah, but one country, — God's blessing upon 
her! — 

Ah, but one only is precious to me ; 
Dear for her mountains, rock-based, cloudy- 
crested, 

Hooded with snow 'mid the ardors of June, 
— Haunts where the bald-headed eagle has 
nested, 

Staring full hard on his neighbor, the moon ; 
Dear for her vineyards and jessamine gardens, 

Forests of fir-trees and sugar-cane brakes ; 
Dear for her oceans, her twin gray wardens, 

Dear for her girdle of sapphire lakes ; 
Dear for her southwind the prairie that crosses, 

Rippling the wheat like a sunshiny sea ; 
Nay, I could kiss but the least of her mosses, 

All for the love of mine own countrie. 

Veins of fine gold and ribs of strong iron, 

Coal-hoards of centuries, fair-fruited trees, 
Jewels that gleam like the bulwarks of Zion, — 

Least of her wealth may be counted in these. 
Richer she deemeth the hearts she inherits 

Strung by those valorous pilgrims of God, 
Who wrested their bread from the rock, till 
their spirits 

Hardened to mate with the granite they trod. 
Peace to the homespun, the heroes who wore it, 

Whose patriot passion in stormy career 



MINE OWN COUNTRIE. 37 

Swept back the redcoats seaward before it, 
Like wind-driven leaves in the wane of the 
year. 

Peace be to each who embellished her story, 
Struck with the sabre or prayed on the knee, 

Sat in her council or sung of her glory, 
All for the love of mine own countrie. 

Tell me not now of the blots that bestain 
her 

Beautiful vestments, that sully the white. 
If by my tears she were aught the gainer, 

Fain would I weep for her day and night ; 
If by my blood I could purge her forever 

From shame of the Indian, shame of the 
slave, 
Would I shower it forth in as ruddy a river 

As ever crusader for Holy Land gave. 
Fair is the star, though the mists may dim her ; 

Mists are fleeting, but stars endure ; 
Soon, full soon, shall the golden glimmer 

Wax to a splendor superb and pure. 
Fling to the breezes the star-spangled banner, 

Greet it with cheers to the three times three. 
Smiles chase tears in the good old manner, 

All for the love of mine own countrie. 

Land of Promise ! By one hearth kneeling, 
Long for thy peace may thy sons agree ! 



38 THE SONGS OF THE FUTURE. 

May dews of health and shadows of healing 

Fall from the leaves of thy Liberty Tree ! 
Dare to be noble, my nation. Go fashion 

Deeds that thine angel record not with ruth. 
Wear on thy heart the white rose of compas- 
sion, 

Conquer thy foes by forbearance and truth. 
Still by the need of thy sires storm-driven, 

Glad in strange waters their vessels to moor 
Open thy gates, O thou favored of Heaven, 

Open them wide to the homeless and poor. 
So shall the peoples, from ocean to ocean, 

Bring precious tribute of blessing to thee. 
So shall thy children yield loyal devotion, 

All for the love of mine own countrie. 




THE SONGS OF THE FUTURE. 

MERICA, my mother and my queen, 
Thou living Presence that art some- 
thing more 

Than cloud-enfolded hills or foam-lit shore, 
Or steepled towns, yet silent and unseen, 
Save as thou lendest to this garment sheen 
The impress of that grace for which men pour 
Dear blood in battle, toward the Delphic door 
Of the closed centuries I feel thee lean, 
Young, eager, beautiful, to know thy fates. 



A SONG OF WAKING. 39 

One fate is told. This money-maddened throng 

Moves to the twilight of its troubled day, 

And high souls stand without yon shadowy 

gates, 
Thy flame-crowned bards, no echo-voices they, 
Whose lips shall flood the waiting world with 

song. 




A SONG OF WAKING. 

HE maple buds are red, are red, 
The robin's call is sweet; 
The blue sky floats above thy head, 
The violets kiss thy feet. 
The sun paints emeralds on the spray, 

And sapphires on the lake \ 
A million wings unfold to-day, 
A million flowers awake. 

Their starry cups the cowslips lift 

To catch the golden light, 
And like a spirit fresh from shrift 

The cherry-tree is white. 
The innocent looks up with eyes 

That know no deeper shade 
Than falls from wings of butterflies, 

Too fair to make afraid. 



40 A SOJVG OF WAKING. 

With long, green raiment blown and wet, 

The willows, hand in hand, 
Lean low to teach the rivulet 

What trees may understand 
Of murmurous tune and idle dance, 

With broken rhymes whose flow 
A poet's ear shall catch, perchance, 

A score of miles below. 

Across the sky to fairy-realm 

There sails a cloud-born ship, 
A wind-sprite standeth at the helm 

W T ith laughter on his lip. 
The melting masts are tipped with gold ; 

The broidered pennons stream. 
The vessel beareth in her hold 

The lading of a dream. 

It is the hour to rend thy chains, 

The blossom-time of souls. 
Yield all the rest to cares and pains ; 

To-day delight controls. 
Gird on thy glory and thy pride, 

For growth is of the sun ; 
Expand thy wings, whate'er betide, 

The summer is begun. 



THE PRAISE OF NATURE. 4 1 




THE PRAISE OF NATURE. 

1. 

MOTHER Nature, look upon thine 

own ! 
From men and cities and the thronging 

ways 
We come to fall before thy gracious throne, 

In this deep solitude, where thou wilt raise 
Our burdened hearts, bewildered with the bliss 
And changing anguish of tumultuous days, 

To thy pure heights of peace. Ah, mother, 

kiss 
The fever from our lips that lost their song 
When they forgot thy touch, as seabirds miss 

The passion of their wings when human wrong 
Hath borne them inland from their natal spray. 
Calm goddess, speak thy word that maketh 
strong, 

While o'er our wearied brows light shadows 

play, 
Dropt from the leaves that fleck the azure day. 



42 THE PRAISE OF NA TURE. 

II. 

Lo, the delight of Nature ! Ye who feel 
Yourselves but slaves beneath the blind control 
Of Circumstance, and bear his insolent heel 

On your submissive necks, who yield the soul 
To the despondent hour that wasteth it, 
Forgetting how on rude and paltry scroll 

Fair signs and sacred words may yet be writ, 
Come to our joyous mother ! Where she leads 
Her fleecy streamlets down the hillsides, sit 

And let the dawning wind that wakes the reeds 
Refresh your heavy lids, whilst ye behold 
How sunshine revels in the lowliest weeds, 

And only human growths refuse to fold, 
In narrow cups their heritage of gold. 

in. 

And ye who bow before the Commonplace, — 
A generous peasant but a clownish king, — 
Return to Nature, till the oldtime grace 

Flow once again from that sequestered spring, 
Deep in the dim recesses of the heart, 
Where each man hides a poet. Would ye 
bring 



THE PRAISE OF NATURE. 43 

Food to his famished lips, forsake the mart, 
And through the forest guide your haunted feet. 
No curious nymph may thrust the boughs apart 

With dewy arm ; the Dryads grow discreet, 
And scarcely is there found a modern breeze 
So swift that it may catch the echoes sweet 

Of laughter delicate within the trees. 
Yet spirits fill the wood for him who sees. 

IV. 

Yea, for the souls in pain our goddess waits 
With healing symbols. See her ocean beat 
On barren sands and foam in rocky straits 

With unavailing flow and vain retreat. 
A restless breast that hoary pilgrim hath ; 
Dead faces touch it coldly, and his feet 

Rage round the frozen shores with fruitless 

wrath, 
To escape his bondage. But yon moon, as chill 
As some relentless conscience, points the path, 

And, moaning, he obeys. Look higher still. 
Within those circling spheres are fiery wars, 
And yet their beauteous orbits they fulfill. 



44 WON NOBIS SOLUM. 

So teach us, mother, o'er our throbbing scars, 
The silence and the glory of the stars. 




NON NOBIS SOLUM. 

OT for ourselves alone ! 
The universal tone 

Of Nature thus our poor self-seeking 
chideth. 
There lives no bloom that in sweet chalice 

hideth 
Her scent, no star but his wan gleam divideth 
With leaf and wayside stone. 
Not for ourselves alone ! 

Not for ourselves alone ! 

Beneath God's burning throne 
The ethereal soul was clothed with form and 

feeling 
To work some earthly task of cheer or healing, 
Strike out some spark of noble deeds, revealing 

The flame whence all are blown. 

Not for ourselves alone ! 

Not for ourselves alone ! 

The seeds our hands have sown 
Shall yield their harvest to a younger reaper. 
We battle, heirs of many a church-yard sleeper. 



ONCE AND AGAIN. 45 

For scions to come, whose sworded thoughts 
strike deeper 
Than any we have known. 
Not for ourselves alone ! 

Not for ourselves alone ! 

O spirit, overgrown 
With tangled wrongs and strange confusions, 

bruising 
The wings of thy first faith, take courage, losing 
Thyself to find thyself, in patience choosing 

This watchword as thine own, — 

Not for ourselves alone ! 




ONCE AND AGAIN. 

O a lonely lake 'mid the high hills hid- 
den, 
In the golden hush of the afternoon, 
A poet came, as a guest long bidden, 

With dust -dimmed raiment and wayworn 
shoon. 
Sly Time had stolen his cheeks' first flushes ; 

As the early dawning his brow was wan ; 
And his sudden steps from the silent rushes 
Scared the swan. 

For when before had the wild swan hearkened 
The falling foot of a human guest ? 



46 ONCE AND AGAIN. 

When had man's wavering shadow darkened 
The bending rushes above her nest ? 

Once and again are her calm years numbered, 
Since the poet knelt by the lake's blue brink, 

And his red lips, kissing the lilies that slumbered, 
Laughed to drink. 

Then was his spirit with song upwelling, 
As a silver brook in the sunny time. 

His fancies flew to their native dwelling 
In shapes of beauty and sounds of rhyme. 

A thousand thoughts grew green in the hedges, 
And rippled for him on the wind-blown mere, 

And the dewdrop left on the daisy's edges 
Held a sphere. 

When the wine o'erfloweth, hasten to drink it, 
Lest thy thirst shall find but the bitter lees. 
Ere the deep waves whelm and the dark storms 
sink it, 
Sail thy ship for the purple seas. 
Few are the mortals who wrest the story 

From the tight-shut fingers of Fame, the 
strong \ 
Fewest of few for whose coming, glory 
Waiteth long. 

Alas for the poet ! his feet are whitened 

With the trodden dust of the hard high road. 



RAINY DA VS. 47 

Alas for men ! whom he might have lightened 
By mirth and music of half their load. 

Will he sit him down in the long-lost places, 
And with sad eyes dazed by the shine of gold, 

Read Nature's soul in her stranger faces 
Known of old ? 

Will his wistful heart weave aforetime visions 

From floating drifts in the dreamy sky ? 
Or, wrapt in the web of the world's derisions, 
Is the bold hope bowed that has soared so 
high? 
It is fled as the foam that the brief wave crested. 

There is nothing left in the poet's view 
Save the circling swan which glides, white- 
breasted, 

On the blue. 




RAINY DAYS. 

HE Spring Day rose from her sleeping 
In the deep, dim caverns of mist, 
With the waiting world to be keeping 
Her brief and beautiful tryst. 
But her sweet eyes opened weeping, 
As the sunshine their pale lids kissed, 
And thus she arose from her sleeping 
In the caverns of eastern mist. 



48 THE GOLDEN WEDDING. 

The World had dreamed of the meeting 
From the first of the farthest years, 
But her hand was cold to his greeting, 
And her cheeks were bitter with tears. 
Her voice was the wind, repeating 
The pain of the heart that hears, 
But the World was glad of the meeting 
To the last of the lingering years. 

For forth from her tears came flowers, 
And out of her grief delight ; 
The buds swelled under the showers, 
The blossoms, with sandals white, 
Climbed up to their greenwood bowers 
From the broken seeds and night. 
But who could foretell the flowers, 
Or see in the grief delight ? 




THE GOLDEN WEDDING. 

H, the golden sunshine crept through 
the autumn trees and slept 
On her shining head bowed meekly 
coming from the house of God, 
And along the woodland road, wending to her 
new abode, 
Where the April wind had sowed, laughed 
the nodding golden-rod. 



THE GOLDEN WEDDING. 49 

Thus my grandsire led his bride, lily-robed and 
gentian-eyed, 
Past the brook that sang unceasing her new 
name in silver tone, 
Underneath the maple grove, where the leaves 
such carpet wove, 
As their jealous blushes strove to surpass the 
lady's own, 

To a cottage, woodbine-thatched, whose rude 
door his hand unlatched, 
While above the drooping eyelids with their 
dreamy smile below, 
Close he bent his comely head, — so the gosspi 
squirrels said, 
Peeping through the oak-leaves red, fifty 
happy years ago. 

For their love white plumage lent to the days 
of their content, 
And so swift the singing seasons flew before 
their wedded feet, 
That themselves might scarcely know where the 
sunbeams met the snow, 
And the blossoms ceased to blow in the 
shadow of the wheat. 

Thus their youth ran into age, and albeit their 
pilgrimage 



SO THE GOLDEN WEDDING. 

Knew full many a thorn-set passage where 
they fainted as they trod, 
When the brooding sunset light flooded every 
vale and height, 

All the w r ay seemed golden bright, in the con- 
stant smile of God. 

And my grandsire, looking back o'er the long, 
illumined track, 
Counting fifty years like jewels in his mar- 
riage diadem, 
Stooped anew to kiss the brows of his worn 
and withered spouse, 
Calling all his scattered house to return and 
feast with them. 

Straight we flocked from east and west back to 
the forsaken nest, 
Some w r ith storm-beat crests ; and others 
graced by gentle, dove-like ways ; 
Eagle hearts and pinions strong ; twilight voices 
sweet of song, 
And the twittering broods that throng on the 
leafy summer sprays. 

From the north and south we came, all the 
children of his name, 
Blown like autumn leaves together homeward 
to the parent tree, 



THE GOLDEN WEDDING. 5 1 

And he blest us one and each in his quaint, un- 
lettered speech, 
Praying all our feet might reach mansions by 
the crystal sea. 

Then with smiles and tender tears, honoring the 
garnered years, 
We in turn our costly tokens did with loving 
hands unfold, 
But the old man turned him where little faces 
pressed his chair, 
For the gifts he counted fair were those 
clustering heads of gold. 

Yet with pitying eyes and dim looked the wed- 
ding-guests on him, 
Stepping softly like sojourners in a conse- 
crated place, 
For the weary, white-haired bride lay in pain 
till eventide, 
And before the dawn she died, smiling in her 
husband's face. 

Noiselessly on plumes of flame to their sister 

angels came, 
All the starlight flushed with angels, lifting 

her beyond the stars, 
Where the golden harp she bears echoes down 

the jasper stairs, 



52 OUR BABY. 

And the golden crown she wears glimmers 
through the pearly bars. 

Oh, once more the sunshine crept through the 
Autumn trees and slept 
On her faded hands crossed meekly borne 
from out the house of God, 
And beside the woodland road wending to her 
last abode, 
Where the April wind had sowed, wept the 
dewy golden-rod. 




OUR BABY. 

HAT is most like her, our baby sweet, 
Strayed from the skies on yester-even, 
So newly come that her dimpled feet 
Still are missed in the gate of Heaven, 
Where the angels kissed them and bade them 

go. 
What is most like her ? Don't you know? 

The bud of a rose, — of a moss-rose, fair, 
Flushed and dainty, a folded flower, 
The blossom a woman is fain to wear 
Over the heart. May sun and shower 
Brim her cup to the overflow 
With dewy perfumes, if this be so. 



SLEEPING BESSIE, 53 

Or call her rather a nestling dove 

That fluttered down through the moonlight 

amber, 
To be brooded under the wings of love 
Here in a hushed and happy chamber. 
May never a stain of our earth below 
Dim her plumage, if this be so. 

Or else I deem her a spell-bound lute, 
Unconscious yet of her songful mission, 
The silver melodies sealed and mute, 
Waiting the breath of the sweet musician, 
Even of Life. May Grief and Woe 
Melt in her music, if this be so. 

I liken her unto a pearl, — a pearl 
From seas of trouble. But whist, my numbers ! 
What strains are these for our baby-girl, 
Shut like a star in a mist of slumbers ? 
They vex her dreams with their tuneless flow. 
She heard the angels a night ago. 




SLEEPING BESSIE. 

IGHTLY tread who come to peep 
At the little maiden's sleep. 
Let your steps the carpet cross, 
Soft as sunshine over moss, 
Lest her dream should suffer loss. 



54 SLEEPING BESSIE. 

Hushed the baby lies, so late 
Entered through the crystal gate 
That a calm and holy grace, 
Borrowed from some blessed place, 
Shineth still within her face. 

Lashes, laid in slumber meek, 
Fringe with gold a tender cheek, 
Tinted like the dewy sprays 
Of the blossomed peach, whose praise 
Floods the robin's roundelays. 

And as if a white-rose tree 
Dropped its daintiest petal, se 
How the dimpled hand gleams fair 
Through the ripples of her hair, 
Clasped by angels unaware. 

Who shall sing her cradle-song ? 
Silver streams would do her wrong ; 
Whispering leaves are over rude, 
And the twitter in the wood 
From the linnet's nestling brood. 

Flowers we shed, in lieu of speech, 
With a blessing shut in each, 
Culled at dawn from emerald dells, 
Where the wild bee longest dwells, 
Cradled deep in honey bells. 



SLEEPING BESSIE. 55 

Strew the sweets above her rest, 
Only hearts-ease on the breast, 
By our potent sylvan art 
Charming thus the budding heart 
From all thorny sting and smart. 

On the blue eyes, curtained fast, 
Blue forget-me-nots we cast. 
Mayflowers pink we scatter free 
O'er the feet. On hill and lea 
Fragrant may their treading be ! 

Last of all are lilies given, 
That the maiden soul to Heaven 
May uplift its chalice white, 
Where the teardrops of the night 
Turn to pearls with dawning light. 

Nay ; but here there bendeth one 
Doth out-bless our benison. 
Deepest love is purest prayer, 
Mounting high the starry stair 
To the Love beyond compare. 

See ! she stirs. The dimple dips 
All about the drowsy lips. 
Bonny dreams blue eyes beguile 
Not so well but mother's smile 
Shall to waking reconcile. 



56 UNFORGIVEN. 




UNFORGIVEN. 

AST thou brought the kiss that for- 
giveth wrong 
To his lips too cold to ask it ? 
Didst thou deem the buds he missed so long 

Would blossom upon his casket ? 
In the heaven-gate he may scarcely wait 

To look on thy last love-token, 
Now that the silver cord is loosed 
And the golden bowl is broken. 

The silver cord, the shining cord, 

With all thine heart-strings woven 
Is rent away, and by fiery sword 

Thy mail of pride is cloven. 
No tears so salt can cleanse thy fault, 

And the bitter words once spoken, 
Long ere the silver cord was loosed, 

Or the golden bowl was broken. 

The bowl that stood with thirsty brim 

From off its shattered edges 
Lets slip thy wine of love, too dim 

With old forgotten pledges. 
Too late, too late for love or hate. 

Be our words of pardon spoken, 
Or ever the silver cord is loosed, 

Or the golden bowl is broken. 




SEEKING THE SPRING. 57 



SEEKING THE SPRING. 

WO shepherds sate in a cavern gate 
And plained for the frozen rills, 
The pale clouds low with the heavy 
snow, 
And the flock-forsaken hills. 
Their empty pipes on their silent lips 

Lay chill as the icy spears 
That grow where the snow from the tree-bough 
drips 
Like a wood-nymph's falling tears, 
A nymph hid dark in the rugged bark 
From the unbelieving years. 

" I will go," saith one, " to seek the Sun, 

And his daughter, the Spring, to spy, 
In the windy east where they lie and feast 

In a nook of the misted sky." 
So he clasped his pipe to his songless breast, 

The shepherd who sought the Spring, 
And left his fellow to scorn the quest 

And wait for her steps to bring 
The music gift that his heart should lift 

To the level where high hearts sing. 

'Neath the morning star, by the ocean far, 
The seeker the Spring did find. 



58 SEEKING THE SPRING. 

With a timid grace she had hid her face 

In a veil of inwoven wind, 
Where shining raindrops, and calls of birds, 

And odors of buds awake, 
Touched the shepherd's lips with a sense of 
words, 

And he sang, for the Spring's sweet sake, 
Till the snow-bound woods and the frosted 
floods 

The chains of their bondage brake. 

Then the Spring danced on till her white feet 
shone 

On the slope of the western wave, 
And the shepherd rose from his dim repose, 

Who had slumbered within the cave ; 
But every blossom had seen the Spring 

And was brimmed with her scent and hue, 
And every thrush in his leafy swing 

Knew all that the shepherd knew. 
Who would care to hear, though he carolled 
clear, 

When the soft spring breezes blew ? 



OUT OF SIGHT OF LAND. 59 



OUT OF SIGHT OF LAND. 



1. 




E are at sea, at sea, at sea, 
Still floating onward dreamily. 
The isles and capes fall far behind, 
Blown backward by the salty wind. 
The sky her sapphire chalice turns 
Upon the deep, which gleams and burns 
With sunlight ; in the midst we ride, 
A fleck upon the sheeny tide. 
Millions of sparkles leap and dance, 
Above the blinding, blue expanse ; 
And on the round horizon-rim 
The ghosts of vessels dawn and dim. 
Beneath our bended glances break 
The splendors of the restless wake. 
We watch the iris-shedding wheel ; 
We hear the swift melodious keel, 
And wonder, when with placid eye 
Some strange sea-monarch plunges by 
Between his waves in marshaled file 
That doff their white-plumed caps the while. 

11. 

We are at sea, at sea, at sea, 
Still floating onward dreamily. 



60 UNDER THE SNOWS. 

What is this marvel that is wrought 
Within our silent haunts of thought ? 
We hail no ships of roseate shells ; 
We catch no mermaid's bridal bells ; 
No siren's song with yearning stirs 
The souls of drifting mariners. 
The world, alas ! hath waxed too wise 
To trust her cradle lullabies. 
And nevermore her feet may stand 
In moonlight glades of fairyland. 
Yet on the main whose gray heart beat 
Beneath the westward-sailing fleet 
That bore Columbus, 'neath the sun 
That shone on builded Babylon, 
Ourselves unto ourselves grow strange, 
Made conscious of our mortal change. 
We are the dream, and only we, 
'Twixt the enduring sky and sea. 




UNDER THE SNOWS. 

NDER the drifted snows, with weeping 
and holy rite, 
For a little maid's repose let the 
lonely bed be dight. 
Cold is the cradle cover our pitiful hands fold 

over 
The heart that had won repose or ever it knew 
delight. 



FLIGHT. 6 1 

High are the heavens and steep to us who 
would enter in 

By the fasts that our faint hearts keep and the 
thorn-set crowns we win. 

Sweetly the child awaketh, brightly the day- 
dawn breaketh 

On the eyes that fell asleep or ever they looked 
on sin. 




FLIGHT. 

RAY shadows roughen all the sea, 
The birds are met on rock and tree, 
But no debate of love or hate 
Doth sway this busy company. 

Ah, what impatient pulses beat 

In those poised wings, what sudden heat 

To quit the isle whose April smile 
The blithe nest-builders found so sweet ! 

The silent, dark, unswerving line, 
Obedient to the impulse fine, 

Begins its flight at shut of night 
Across the leagues of bitter brine. 

Before tnem lie the gardens fair 
With balm and bloom and purple air. 



62 THE CHAMBER OF PEACE. 

They leave behind the boding wind, 
The frosted fields, the branches bare. 

Frail lovers of the languid rose, 
A nobler joy yon raven knows, 

That dares abide the wintry tide 
And revel in the blinding snows. 

Thou, too, O soul, disdain to flee 
Where siren ease would beckon thee. 

In stress and strain and battle-pain, 
Win thou thy peace by victory. 




THE CHAMBER OF PEACE. 

"Windows that looked toward the Sun-Rising, and the 
name of that chamber was Peace." 

N that volume penned in prison 
For the faith of Christ arisen, 
On that web of golden fancies 
Spun in holy Bunyan's trances, 
Long I mused a Sabbath even, 
Weary with the march toward heaven. 

Even as Christian, once benighted, 
Sloth-betrayed and sore affrighted 
For the roaring of the lion, 
Darkling trod the path to Zion. 



THE BIRTH OF SPRING. 63 

But for him, though long belated, 
Still the wide-swung portals waited ; 

Still the gracious, white-robed maiden 
Welcomed in the heavy-laden. 
And in slumber-haunted chamber, 
Facing orient skies of amber, 
From his grief he found release, 
For that chamber's name was Peace. 

Lord of Pilgrims, be entreated 

Still to succor souls defeated ! 

Wash our stains more white than wool 

In thy Palace Beautiful, 

That our tears awhile may cease, 

Resting in thy perfect peace. 




THE BIRTH OF SPRING. 

HE sun hath returned to the land 
And the breath of his coming is 
sweet. 

The wood-trees eagerly stand, 
Their brown arms reaching for heat. 
The white lights quiver and shiver 
And flash and leap on the river, 
And the snow-strips wax fainter and fair, 
Till I fain would lie silent, forever and aye, 



64 THE BIRTH OF SPRING. 

Held close to the breast of the radiant day 
And fed with her odorous air. 



But the sun demandeth his song 

And the waters are wooing a praise, 
And methinks that my heart groweth strong 

In the promise and pride of the days. 
And my mouth that has gnawed on the vines 
Winter-beaten and faded and cold, 
Is athirst for the harvested wines 
And the fair-fashioned vessels of gold, 
Which the goddess of life shall hold to the lips, 
Ere the changing earth in the shadow dips, 
And the hours of light are told. 

The sunshine strikes down to my soul, 
And my soul reaches up to the sun. 

Farewell to the days of thy dole, 

For the days of thy triumph are won, 

O Faith, and thy wings are alight 

With the morning that follows the night. 

Forgotten are winter and death, 

In the power and presence of God, 

For the murmuring winds are his breath, 
And in blossoms He treadeth the sod. 

But the sun demandeth his song 
And the waters are wooing a praise, 

And methinks that my heart groweth strong 
In the promise and pride of the days. 



THE NEW JERUSALEM. 65 

And my mouth that has gnawed on the vines 

Winter-beaten and faded and cold, 

Is athirst for the harvested wines 

And the fair-fashioned vessels of gold, 

Which the goddess of truth shall hold to the 

lips 
Ere the passing soul in the shadow dips 
And the hours of life are told. 




THE NEW JERUSALEM. 

HEN the birds have hushed their 
choirs, 
Through the sunset's rifted fires, 
Like a queenly diadem 
Gleam afar the golden spires 
Of the New Jerusalem. 

Thorny be our path and sterile, 
There is rest from pain and peril, 

Where with many a flashing gem, 
Jasper, chrysolite, and beryl, 

Shines the New Jerusalem. 

Not for these my heart beats faster, 
But for her ascended Master. 

Oh, to touch his garment's hem 
In the courts of alabaster, 

In the New Jerusalem ! 



66 AZRAEL. 



AZRAEL. 




F all the angels whose melodious breath 
The Sapphire Throne with praise en- 
compasseth, 
Amid that rainbow-plumed, ecstatic choir 
Most beautiful art thou, benignant Death. 

For we who dwell beneath this cloudy tent 
Some changing years, are all too early spent 

By covert griefs that fret the heart like fire, 
Our staffs soon broken and our sandals 
rent. 

i 

Though sweet the grace of moon-enchanted 

night 
And day serene in amethystine light, 

Matched with the joys of sense, our souls rise 

higher, 
And human tears may shut the stars from 

sight. 

But, awful Friend, the touch of thy chill palm 
Falls on the fevered heart like healing balm, 
Till fitful bliss, keen pain and wild desire 
Lie hushed together in most holy calm. 



THE REMONSTRANCE. 6j 

What though thy cup, with dark devices chased, 
Strike pallor down the lip, to mortal taste 
So passing bitter with the Stygian mire 
And nightshade plucked on sad Cimmerian 
waste ? 

Yet when the mystic veil about thee rolled 
Shifts for a fleeting space its sable fold, 

Blown by the flame of the funereal pyre, 
Thy vesture gleams of bright, celestial gold. 

Gloom-mantled herald of the light to be, 
Thy dusky wings that spread from sea to sea 
Hide us from evil, and thy sword, though 
dire 
The sweeping blade, sets sorrow's captives free. 

Of all the angels whose melodious breath 
The Sapphire Throne with praise encompasseth, 

Amid that rainbow-plumed, ecstatic choir 
Most beautiful art thou, benignant Death. 




THE REMONSTRANCE. 

EARY of life ? But what if death 
To new confusion bids ? 
Who knows if labor ends with breath, 
Or tears with folded lids ? 



68 THE REMONSTRANCE. 

The spirit still may miss of rest, 
Though oft the daisies blow 

Above the hushed and darkened breast 
Shut close from sun and snow. 

Those halls, all curiously planned, 
Lie void, but whither thence 

Hath fled the tenant ? Shall the wand 
Of peace her dews dispense 

In equal share to hearts that beat 

Undaunted till the even, 
And rebels whose unbidden feet 

Would storm the heights of heaven ? 

Perchance no soul shall taste of sleep 

Until its task be sped. 
The charge the living failed to keep 

Goes over to the dead. 

One perfect and mysterious Will 
Threads all this mortal maze, 

And calls each human voice to fill 
Some silent note of praise. 

The shadowy, as the sunlit hours, 

That holy Will confess. 
Death holds no secret slumber-bowers 

For our unfaithfulness. 



THE REMONSTRANCE. 69 

Then while the morning still is fair, 

The earth-winds o'er thee play, 
Speed on the Master's work, and bear 

The burden of thy day. 

Ay, welcome each new toil and pain, 

The fiery angels sent 
To teach our harps their golden strain, 

While yet in banishment ; 

Lest e'en for thee, whose steps may roam 

Far in some tangled glade, 
When all the sons of God flock home, 

The feast should be delayed. 

For, oh ! too long, too long we fare 

Without our Father's gate. 
" Thy kingdom come ! " is all our prayer, 

And still it cometh late. 

Not wrath, dear Lord, thy mercy seals. 

Our own unrighteous hands 
Hold back thy shining chariot-wheels, 

And rob the wistful lands. 

For none shall walk in perfect white 

Till every soul be clean \ 
So close for sorrow and delight 

These human spirits lean. 



JO THE NEW YEAR. 

But thou go forth and do thy deed, 

In forest and in town, 
Nor sigh for ease, while pain and need 

Are plucking at thy gown. 

And thus, when bitter turneth sweet, 

And every heart is blest, 
Perchance to thee God's hand shall mete 

His unimagined rest. 




THE NEW YEAR. 

ONG foretold by those prophets old, 
The sun, the moon, and the stars, 
The New Year waits at Time's high 
gates 
And clashes the golden bars. 
And the soul of the world awakens and gropes 
In a twilight glimmer of fears and hopes, 
As a new wave breaks on the beaten shores, 
As a new foot falls on the trodden floors, 
And a New Year stands with uplifted hands 
In the light of the opened doors. 

All uncrowned, with his hair unbound, 
His white hair loose on the wind, 
The Old Year goes to his long repose, 
But he casts his gifts behind. 



THE NEW YEAR. 7 1 

And he bears our curses, he carries our thanks, 
As he takes his place in the pilgrim ranks 
Of the dim-eyed years who journey along, 
Shrilling us back a discordant song, 
That mingles and blends with the distance'and 
ends 
In a harmony soft and strong. 

Long foretold, in the morning cold, 

With pain and music and mirth, 

The New Year gleams on the broken dreams 

Of the fast-revolving earth. 
A secret, a change, and a mystery, 
What hath not been and what is to be, 
Nourished and cherished and hidden away, 
Saved by Time for this ripening day, 
To work a deed forever decreed 

And a mission it must obey. 

All unknown, it is thou alone 
Who canst tell thine errand aright, 
A whispered thought when the world was not 
And a sign made in the night. 
Far from the touch of our vain surmise, 
In thy folded hours thy meaning lies, 
To some for blessing, to some for curse, 
Yet none would thy destined dawn disperse, 
For it works in the plan that is more than man 
And is well for the universe. 






LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 




015 973 232 



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